Up and Down Wall Street

Too Big to Jail

U.S. attorney general admits to concern about impact on markets of prosecuting bankers and banks suspected of violating the law.

"All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others," George Orwell famously wrote in his allegory on totalitarianism, Animal Farm.

Mammoth banks have been more equal than others for some time. Ever since the bailout of Continental Illinois, which, in an ironically Orwellian twist, took place in 1984, megabanks have been deemed "too big to fail" because of the feared impact of the failure of any...